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Good document management software can take over much of the work and free the small businessperson to focus on the business. We look at this issue in more detail below.
Managing Documents is Something the Businessperson Cannot Escape
Managing documents can be a major task for any business that's not a tiny operation. The process begins even before you start the business.
Project reports need to be prepared to evaluate the business proposal as well as to show to various agencies. Applications for business licenses have to be completed and submitted. Bank loans need to be applied for, along with a lot of supporting documents.
Once the business starts, document management becomes a critical issue. Unless properly managed, total chaos can result. You might not be able to bill for the deliveries you have made, or get paid for the bills you managed to get out. Suppliers might start pressuring you for payment just when your cash has run out. Tax inspectors might be breathing down your neck for details of your business transactions.
The resulting problems can invariably affect your business. You'll be fighting fires on various fronts instead of going after sales, locating low-cost sources to arrange deliveries, and doing all the other really important things.
Invest in Good Document Management Software
Trying to manage documents by hand is not only obsolete, but also affects your competitiveness. With any volume of documents to handle, manual document management takes an unduly long proportion of your time even if you have a good document management system in place.
Those competitors who have installed a computer and document management software have a great advantage over you. The software makes all the document management tasks fantastically easy and the competitor has far more time for key business activities.
Just What is Document Management?
Documents have to be created, retrieved when needed, and stored safely from loss and unauthorized eyes.
Elaborating a little, good document management involves the following key tasks:
Capturing the details at the most convenient points for creating the document
Organizing the documents in a manner that facilitates their retrieval whenever needed and convenient storage
Arranging for proper security against such dangers as loss, theft, and leakage of sensitive business data
Done manually, these are all time (and space) consuming tasks. Done electronically using a computer, all of these tasks become amazingly efficient and speedier.
For example, many business transactions involve accessing the same document by different departments and persons. In a manual system, this would mean passing the document from person to person or making expensive copies of the original. In a computerized system, the document is captured in a central computer and concerned persons can access it from their workstation computers.
For security, the original paper documents (if any) can be stored safely away and access to the electronic equivalent in the computer can be restricted to authorized persons by the use of such devices as permissions and passwords.
Retrieval of the documents also becomes recognizably faster because the document management software can retrieve any document in seconds, using search facilities or meta information. Compare this with going to a filing cabinet, locating the particular folder, finding the needed document in the folder, and bringing it to the workstation.
Conclusion
Document management is an "unavoidable evil" in any business that is more than tiny in size. Done properly, it can achieve better business results. Neglected, it could lead to chaos and endless troubles.
Good document management software attends to this function effectively and saves you an amazing amount of time and cost.
We look at this issue in the following sections, starting first with a look at exactly what document management software does.
What Does Document Management Software Do?
A good document management system captures all kinds of documents with little difficulty. Thus paper documents can be scanned and OCRed and electronic documents can be captured by browsing to its location on the local computer. The documents captured are stored in a central computer so that all the workstation computers connected to it can access them.
The documents can be indexed by different criteria such as document name or date of creation and they can also be indexed by their contents. It's then possible to retrieve documents by specifying the document name, date, words included in the content, etc. The retrieval takes no more than a few seconds at most.
Security is maintained by restricting document access. Granting different kinds of permissions to authorized persons restricts access. Some might have the 'read' permission; others might also have the 'write' permission.
After retrieval, documents can be modified, appended with new pages, replaced, or even deleted, provided necessary permissions are granted.
What Business Benefits Can Be Expected?
The ease of access to relevant documents makes it more likely that decision makers would indeed access them and make informed decisions.
For example, before passing a supplier invoice, concerned persons will retrieve the relevant order and verify the price, delivery date and other terms with little delay. In a non-computer system, this involves locating the order stored in an inconveniently-located filing cabinet. It might even happen that a copy of the order has not yet been received by the invoice-passing department. The verification could get unduly delayed (leading to supplier displeasure) or even omitted (probably leading to excess payment) in such cases.
Another immediate benefit is the speed of actions. When needed information can be obtained in minutes, actions also tend to be quicker. Instead of verifying 20 or so invoices a day, it might be possible to verify 200 or more invoices a day.
Better business results follow when quick and correct decisions are taken on a regular basis. In the above case, a supplier who is accustomed to prompt and correct payments from your company is quite likely to oblige you with increased and higher-quality service if necessary.
The above illustration of invoice passing is only a simple example. All key business-result areas can benefit from speedy and convenient access to reliable information. Good document management software makes it easy to capture, review and edit documents, leading to more reliable documentation.
Document Management Software Leads to Better Document Security
It is easy to implement a system of read/write permissions and password-protected access in a computerized document management environment. By making printing possible only on a closely-monitored network printer, even printouts (that can be removed) can be checked.
Paper documents can be stored in more inaccessible places, with greater security. Because copies are available in the computer, these would not be needed as frequently.
Considering that business secrets constitute a competitive advantage, the above kind of increased security could also lead to better business results.
Conclusion
With good document management software, you can make information easily accessible to all persons who need that information for their work. Easy access means that the information will be used to make business decisions. Informed business decisions, when they accumulate, lead to significantly improved business results.
Document security is also easier to implement with good document management software. It's then possible to minimize the harmful damage from unauthorized access to business secrets and competitive advantage.